Where are all you families of high performing students planning on moving to?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

To be honest, yes, I am indeed very afraid of that. So what assurances can you give me that my precious snowflake won’t be adversely affected in any way in terms of quality of education and social influence? Will the on grade level or high performing students receive EQUAL amount of teacher instruction and attention as a low performing student and not simply get shoved to the carpet. And don’t ignore the FACT that FARMS students tend to be low performing. That has already been established in numerous peer reviewed publications. Just give me some kind of assurance.

PP, your kid will most likely be fine. And if your kid isn't fine, it won't be because there are poor kids at your kid's school. Plus, while there may be adverse effects, there may also be benefits. Have you considered the benefits?

-non-poor person whose kids go to school with poor kids

No, I am a pessimist so I prefer to focus on the negatives and trying to reduce them as much as possible. So will my kid get shoved to the carpet to allow the teacher enough time to bring up the low performing kids? Great for the low performing kid but not for mine. So I lose. And I’m hearing I will also have to fork up funds for these kids’ enrichment programs.

OK, then focus on the negatives - no matter what, there's a high chance that your child's education will be terrible. You will lose regardless. There, now you don't have to worry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

It does not matter if FARMS students tend to be low performing. When we look at negative impacts, we do not look at how this will help certain people (that is not called "negative"), we look at how this is going to hurt people.

Effectively, if you look at a plan with which you bring in more low performing (doesn't matter rich or poor, doesn't matter which race) students, that is a negative impact which can't be ignored.

Can I offer something instead: why don't MCPS make it a combination of merit and SES based thing: hold a test (or some other more objective standard/screening on their academic abilities), any FARMS student that can do well in that test/screening can then be eligible for going to a "better" school nearby.

Or, is the BoE really just trying to help those FARMS students who simply do not perform well?

Hey, poor kids! If you do really well on this test, we'll let you go to the rich kids' school!

How do you think that will go over?

Ooooh will the rich poor-performer kids get sent to the poor kids' school then? Or do they get to stay at their rich kids' school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

It does not matter if FARMS students tend to be low performing. When we look at negative impacts, we do not look at how this will help certain people (that is not called "negative"), we look at how this is going to hurt people.

Effectively, if you look at a plan with which you bring in more low performing (doesn't matter rich or poor, doesn't matter which race) students, that is a negative impact which can't be ignored.

Can I offer something instead: why don't MCPS make it a combination of merit and SES based thing: hold a test (or some other more objective standard/screening on their academic abilities), any FARMS student that can do well in that test/screening can then be eligible for going to a "better" school nearby.

Or, is the BoE really just trying to help those FARMS students who simply do not perform well?

Hey, poor kids! If you do really well on this test, we'll let you go to the rich kids' school!

How do you think that will go over?

Ooooh will the rich poor-performer kids get sent to the poor kids' school then? Or do they get to stay at their rich kids' school?

I want to know the answer to that, too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

To be honest, yes, I am indeed very afraid of that. So what assurances can you give me that my precious snowflake won’t be adversely affected in any way in terms of quality of education and social influence? Will the on grade level or high performing students receive EQUAL amount of teacher instruction and attention as a low performing student and not simply get shoved to the carpet. And don’t ignore the FACT that FARMS students tend to be low performing. That has already been established in numerous peer reviewed publications. Just give me some kind of assurance.

It does not matter if FARMS students tend to be low performing. When we look at negative impacts, we do not look at how this will help certain people (that is not called "negative"), we look at how this is going to hurt people.

Effectively, if you look at a plan with which you bring in more low performing (doesn't matter rich or poor, doesn't matter which race) students, that is a negative impact which can't be ignored.

Can I offer something instead: why don't MCPS make it a combination of merit and SES based thing: hold a test (or some other more objective standard/screening on their academic abilities), any FARMS student that can do well in that test/screening can then be eligible for going to a "better" school nearby.

Or, is the BoE really just trying to help those FARMS students who simply do not perform well?

Do you really not see how it would benefit students if there weren't schools with very high FARMS rates? Clearly you don't want your kid to go to a school with a high FARMS rate -- don't you think it would benefit all students not to go to high FARMS schools?

You think FARMS is a important factor to consider.
This is not necessarily the case for everyone else.

I don't care about the FARMS rate itself. I don't want my kid going to a school which has low performance. If the FARMS kids perform better (than non FARMS students),I really don't mind even if it is a 80% FARMS school.

And "to benefit ALL student", no, I don't think so. Politicians want people to believe that, I can certainly understand that part.

A high-FARMs rate is nearly synonymous with low performance. Show just one instance of a school anywhere in the country that has a high FARMs rate but is high performing or a school that has a low FARMs rate and is low performing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
You think FARMS is a important factor to consider.
This is not necessarily the case for everyone else.

I don't care about the FARMS rate itself. I don't want my kid going to a school which has low performance. If the FARMS kids perform better (than non FARMS students),I really don't mind even if it is a 80% FARMS school.

And "to benefit ALL student", no, I don't think so. Politicians want people to believe that, I can certainly understand that part.

A high-FARMs rate is nearly synonymous with low performance. Show just one instance of a school anywhere in the country that has a high FARMs rate but is high performing or a school that has a low FARMs rate and is low performing.

I am not questioning that.

I am just saying, it is fine that you care about performance. But if you want to raise one school's performance by sacrificing another school's, it would be quite natural that parents from the latter school would object. And I can't see how people can be so confident to say this is for a "public good".

The parents of the latter school are not part of the "public"?

[Anonymous]

Round and round and round we go

Both sides are right

Society benefits more if low-performing students are spread amongst schools

Individual higher performing students are hurt and less challenged when lower performing students enter a school tipping point at 20% and 40-45% see below

https://www.boarddocs.com/vsba/fairfax/Board.nsf/f...%202013_technical%20report.pdf

Summary Finding: The study took both a graphical and a statistical approach to answering this question using SY 2011-12 poverty and student achievement data.1 Graphs of school-level pass rates (i.e., the percentage of students in the school above benchmarks on the reading or mathematics SOL tests) and school poverty indicated in general that as levels of school poverty increased, schools were less likely to meet academic performance expectations (i.e., schools were more likely to have SOL pass rates falling below expected levels).
And, almost all schools with poverty levels of 45 percent or higher were unable to reach expected pass rate levels in reading or math. Follow-up statistical analyses found statistical evidence that two tipping points exist in FCPS. The reading data provided the most consistent findings as it indicated two tipping points occurring at 20 and 40-45 percent school-level poverty. Thus, FCPS schools with greater than 20 percent poverty are much less likely to meet performance expectations than those with less than 20 percent poverty. And, once poverty levels at a school reach 40 percent or more, FCPS schools are unlikely to meet expectations for school performance.

Summary Finding: Analyses that allowed school poverty to be teased apart from individual student poverty revealed that school poverty at the elementary level had a demonstrably separate, though smaller, negative association with student learning than individual poverty: school poverty was associated with an average decrease of 8 to 18 scale score points on the SOL reading test. The tipping point identified at 20 percent poverty reflected an acceleration of the overall downward trend in student scores equal to an additional 7-point decrease. The 20 percent tipping point indicates that schools with poverty levels above 20 percent were not as successful with students as those below the 20 percent poverty line. The tipping points identified at 40 and 45 percent poverty reflected the reverse, a slowing down of the observed downward trend, equal to approximately 13 to 16 points. These latter tipping points do not mean that schools above 40 or 45 percent poverty had students with higher test scores; rather, schools above 40 percent poverty had students who did not demonstrate further decreases in reading scores, reflecting a floor to the average reading scale score points at elementary schools in FCPS. It is also important to note that this impact was for all students attending FCPS schools, meaning that both students living in poverty and those not from impoverished backgrounds at the same school demonstrate similar declines in their reading performance when attending schools above the 20 percent poverty tipping point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

To be honest, yes, I am indeed very afraid of that. So what assurances can you give me that my precious snowflake won’t be adversely affected in any way in terms of quality of education and social influence? Will the on grade level or high performing students receive EQUAL amount of teacher instruction and attention as a low performing student and not simply get shoved to the carpet. And don’t ignore the FACT that FARMS students tend to be low performing. That has already been established in numerous peer reviewed publications. Just give me some kind of assurance.

PP, your kid will most likely be fine. And if your kid isn't fine, it won't be because there are poor kids at your kid's school. Plus, while there may be adverse effects, there may also be benefits. Have you considered the benefits?

-non-poor person whose kids go to school with poor kids

No, I am a pessimist so I prefer to focus on the negatives and trying to reduce them as much as possible. So will my kid get shoved to the carpet to allow the teacher enough time to bring up the low performing kids? Great for the low performing kid but not for mine. So I lose. And I’m hearing I will also have to fork up funds for these kids’ enrichment programs.

OK, then focus on the negatives - no matter what, there's a high chance that your child's education will be terrible. You will lose regardless. There, now you don't have to worry.

Please take note everyone, bringing in low performing kids into your school will indeed increase the likelihood that your child’s education will be TERRIBLE as PP just admitted.

#saynotodiversity #highperformersmattertoo

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

You think FARMS is a important factor to consider.
This is not necessarily the case for everyone else.

I don't care about the FARMS rate itself. I don't want my kid going to a school which has low performance. If the FARMS kids perform better (than non FARMS students),I really don't mind even if it is a 80% FARMS school.

And "to benefit ALL student", no, I don't think so. Politicians want people to believe that, I can certainly understand that part.

Ah, you don't mind [Characteristic A], it's [Characteristic B, which is highly correlated with and partly caused by Characteristic A] that you mind!

[Anonymous]

A high-FARMs rate is nearly synonymous with low performance. Show just one instance of a school anywhere in the country that has a high FARMs rate but is high performing or a school that has a low FARMs rate and is low performing.

I can show you a school that isn't performing nearly as high as its demographics would suggest - Westland

I can also show you a school that outperforms expectations, were those expectations based just on FARMS rates - TPMS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

It does not matter if FARMS students tend to be low performing. When we look at negative impacts, we do not look at how this will help certain people (that is not called "negative"), we look at how this is going to hurt people.

Effectively, if you look at a plan with which you bring in more low performing (doesn't matter rich or poor, doesn't matter which race) students, that is a negative impact which can't be ignored.

Can I offer something instead: why don't MCPS make it a combination of merit and SES based thing: hold a test (or some other more objective standard/screening on their academic abilities), any FARMS student that can do well in that test/screening can then be eligible for going to a "better" school nearby.

Or, is the BoE really just trying to help those FARMS students who simply do not perform well?

Hey, poor kids! If you do really well on this test, we'll let you go to the rich kids' school!

How do you think that will go over?

Ooooh will the rich poor-performer kids get sent to the poor kids' school then? Or do they get to stay at their rich kids' school?

I want to know the answer to that, too.

Parents will use the side door to ensure their kids don't fail the test.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

To be honest, yes, I am indeed very afraid of that. So what assurances can you give me that my precious snowflake won’t be adversely affected in any way in terms of quality of education and social influence? Will the on grade level or high performing students receive EQUAL amount of teacher instruction and attention as a low performing student and not simply get shoved to the carpet. And don’t ignore the FACT that FARMS students tend to be low performing. That has already been established in numerous peer reviewed publications. Just give me some kind of assurance.

PP, your kid will most likely be fine. And if your kid isn't fine, it won't be because there are poor kids at your kid's school. Plus, while there may be adverse effects, there may also be benefits. Have you considered the benefits?

-non-poor person whose kids go to school with poor kids

No, I am a pessimist so I prefer to focus on the negatives and trying to reduce them as much as possible. So will my kid get shoved to the carpet to allow the teacher enough time to bring up the low performing kids? Great for the low performing kid but not for mine. So I lose. And I’m hearing I will also have to fork up funds for these kids’ enrichment programs.

OK, then focus on the negatives - no matter what, there's a high chance that your child's education will be terrible. You will lose regardless. There, now you don't have to worry.

Please take note everyone, bringing in low performing kids into your school will indeed increase the likelihood that your child’s education will be TERRIBLE as PP just admitted.

#saynotodiversity #highperformersmattertoo

"Admitted"? PP says they're a pessimist. The pessimist's view is that everything will be terrible. They should be true to their conviction.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

I am not questioning that.

I am just saying, it is fine that you care about performance. But if you want to raise one school's performance by sacrificing another school's, it would be quite natural that parents from the latter school would object. And I can't see how people can be so confident to say this is for a "public good".

The parents of the latter school are not part of the "public"?

Why are we talking about school performance? We're not educating schools. We're educating kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

You think FARMS is a important factor to consider.
This is not necessarily the case for everyone else.

I don't care about the FARMS rate itself. I don't want my kid going to a school which has low performance. If the FARMS kids perform better (than non FARMS students),I really don't mind even if it is a 80% FARMS school.

And "to benefit ALL student", no, I don't think so. Politicians want people to believe that, I can certainly understand that part.

Ah, you don't mind [Characteristic A], it's [Characteristic B, which is highly correlated with and partly caused by Characteristic A] that you mind!

Yes, they are related, but they are not the same thing.

Still I don't mind having a high or low FARMS rate. If you do, please say so.

I don't see anything wrong when I care about the performance of a school, I want a high-performing school. So that is my opinion and I feel confident to say it in public.

Can you say the same about FARMS rate (can you say "I don't see anything wrong about when I care about the FARMS rate of a school. I want a low FARMS school"?)

That is probably why some people just want to tie them together - because they can't argue against people's hope for a high-performing school, so they try to equal that to the hope for a low FARMS school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I am not questioning that.

I am just saying, it is fine that you care about performance. But if you want to raise one school's performance by sacrificing another school's, it would be quite natural that parents from the latter school would object. And I can't see how people can be so confident to say this is for a "public good".

The parents of the latter school are not part of the "public"?

Why are we talking about school performance? We're not educating schools. We're educating kids.

When we say "school performance", we mean "student performance" from that school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Round and round and round we go

Both sides are right

Society benefits more if low-performing students are spread amongst schools

Individual higher performing students are hurt and less challenged when lower performing students enter a school tipping point at 20% and 40-45% see below

https://www.boarddocs.com/vsba/fairfax/Board.nsf/f...%202013_technical%20report.pdf

Summary Finding: The study took both a graphical and a statistical approach to answering this question using SY 2011-12 poverty and student achievement data.1 Graphs of school-level pass rates (i.e., the percentage of students in the school above benchmarks on the reading or mathematics SOL tests) and school poverty indicated in general that as levels of school poverty increased, schools were less likely to meet academic performance expectations (i.e., schools were more likely to have SOL pass rates falling below expected levels).
And, almost all schools with poverty levels of 45 percent or higher were unable to reach expected pass rate levels in reading or math. Follow-up statistical analyses found statistical evidence that two tipping points exist in FCPS. The reading data provided the most consistent findings as it indicated two tipping points occurring at 20 and 40-45 percent school-level poverty. Thus, FCPS schools with greater than 20 percent poverty are much less likely to meet performance expectations than those with less than 20 percent poverty. And, once poverty levels at a school reach 40 percent or more, FCPS schools are unlikely to meet expectations for school performance.

Summary Finding: Analyses that allowed school poverty to be teased apart from individual student poverty revealed that school poverty at the elementary level had a demonstrably separate, though smaller, negative association with student learning than individual poverty: school poverty was associated with an average decrease of 8 to 18 scale score points on the SOL reading test. The tipping point identified at 20 percent poverty reflected an acceleration of the overall downward trend in student scores equal to an additional 7-point decrease. The 20 percent tipping point indicates that schools with poverty levels above 20 percent were not as successful with students as those below the 20 percent poverty line. The tipping points identified at 40 and 45 percent poverty reflected the reverse, a slowing down of the observed downward trend, equal to approximately 13 to 16 points. These latter tipping points do not mean that schools above 40 or 45 percent poverty had students with higher test scores; rather, schools above 40 percent poverty had students who did not demonstrate further decreases in reading scores, reflecting a floor to the average reading scale score points at elementary schools in FCPS. It is also important to note that this impact was for all students attending FCPS schools, meaning that both students living in poverty and those not from impoverished backgrounds at the same school demonstrate similar declines in their reading performance when attending schools above the 20 percent poverty tipping point.

similar finding in moco:

https://tcf.org/assets/downloads/tcf-Schwartz.pdf

The positive slope for the average math performance of children in public housing in low-poverty schools indicates that public housing students in the least-poor schools were catching up to their average non-poor district-mates over the course of elementary school. (Note that the test score scale is constructed such that 50 was the average math score in Montgomery County, regardless of elementary grade level or year.) This means that the average child in public housing started out performing about 17 points (NCE score of 33) below the typical Montgomery County student (NCE score of 50) in math—0.8 of a standard deviation, which comports with the national income achievement gap. Over time, however, children in public housing in the district’s low-poverty schools began to catch up to their non-poor district-mates in math; by the end of elementary school, the math achievement gap halved from an ini-tial disparity of 17 points to 8 points. In contrast, the achievement gap between the children’s average (non-poor) district-mate and the average child in public housing in the district’s poorest elementary schools held constant.

Notably, the children in public housing benefited from attending the lowest-poverty schools even though they were more likely to cluster within non-accelerated math courses in their given schools